This
is actual hidden camera footage of God riding a bicycle. He was on a
whistle-stop tour of Northern power stations when the photo was taken.

People often say
that God is in the details, but I bought a copy of Details magazine
and there was scarcely a mention of God. However, there was an interesting
article reviewing hair gels and I have now started training as a hairdresser.

Martin ate another bowl
of Socko Krispies - the only cereal to contain the natural goodness of
socks! - and contemplated the future. He was due to be executed the
following morning, so this did not take long.

In between spoonfuls
of soggy cereal he puffed heartily on a series of expensive Cuban cigars
that his lawyer had stolen for him. He had never been a smoker, but since
he was going to die, he figured he may as well enjoy himself. It wasn't
working - the cigars choked him and tasted filthy - but he continued to
smoke them since he wasn't going to get his money back.

He thought back to his
childhood and his love of reggae music. He had obviously been very stupid
throughout his youth, because now he hated reggae.

He only
liked music where the singer sounded more miserable than him: The Smiths,
Prefab Sprout and Mariah Carey. He didn't really like music very much at
all, but he liked the idea of people suffering for their art. He was a firm
believer that great artists needed to suffer. Indeed, he would often go
to gallery openings and beat up artists, just to ensure that they were getting
enough pain. He considered himself a modern-day muse.

He had written to the
Burgermeister and pleaded for clemency, and had received a polite note declining
his request and confirming his impending death sentence. He couldn't blame
the Burgermeister; after all he was scheduled for execution for killing
the Burgermesiter's prize bull and then running off with his daughter.

The only bright spot
was that Helen - the Burgermeister's daughter - had been spared death and
had instead been sent to her room with no supper. This cheered him up and
he gave himself an inward pat-on-the-back that he had finally learned to
be happy for someone other than himself. He considered it a real emotional
breakthrough and was looking forward to further development in the afterlife.

He didn't know why he
had killed the bull - or even why he had run off with Helen. It has all
seemed a good idea at the time. His life of crime had started when he was
young. He had taken to ram-raiding at an early age, but lacking the courage
to steal cars, he would simply throw himself at windows and invariably just
bounce off or shatter his tiny limbs. It was not a profitable business,
but it thrilled him with illicit lust.

He though of Helen
and how hungry she must be without any dinner. At least she would be able
to eat tomorrow morning and would witness his execution on a full stomach.
His own tummy rumbled and he pondered whether there would be food in the
afterlife.

Poor
old Linus...dominated and bullied by his older sister; riddled with
doubt and self-pity. There's a bit of Linus in everyone. Well, no, not
in everyone, but in anyone prone to bouts of existential panic and mindless
dread.

If you've ever imploded in public, leaving a messy sludge of viscera
and ego, then you will understand why Linus carries a blanket wherever
he goes.

(when you leave the house, hidden eyes are watching you, they know your
secrets and can expose you as a fraud at any point)

Charlie Brown is also sweet. A lonely failure, standing on his pitcher's
mound in the pouring rain.

But enough about me, tell me more about yourself...

Bald
fact 1) Duncan
Goodhugh lost his hair when he fell out of a tree as a child. He
hit his head and damaged some nerves - all his hair fell out. However,
the radiation spillage from the tree also gave him amazing powers,
he could swim underwater as fast as an eel and could communicate
mentally with all marine life.

Gone
was Duncan the mere mortal...and born was Aquamariner - THE
MAN WITHOUT HAIR.

Bald fact 2) This
is my friend Dave (left). He is bald, although he is still lusted
after by many women.

Bald fact
3) Some
men are born bald. Others have baldness thrust upon them. But no-one
is bald forever.

In
an act of mindless belligerence, I have decided to choose mustard as
the background colour for this box.

I like mustard, and I also like mayonnaise.

Imagine my delight when I discovered that leading supermarkets now stock
a creamilicious new sauce that is a sumptuous blend of mustard and mayonnaise.

This is Mr Pinchy.
He used to be a corporate icon for a large Japanese electronics manufacturer.

But Mr Pinchy wasn't
like other corporate icons - he had morals and ethics. He began to question
the nature of consumerism and whether he should really be using his
cuteness to sell Hi-Fi systems to people who couldn't really afford
them. So, one evening Mr Pinchy planned his dramatic escape. He teamed
up with the only creature he could trust: Phillip the shirehorse. Under
cover of darkness, Mr Pinchy and Phillip fled the confines of the Matsuhuru
Corporation and galloped into the countryside. Now Mr Pinchy lives an
agrarian lifestyle, sustaining himself with nuts and berries and maintaining
the delicate ecosystem.

Some people say
that on quiet nights you can hear the delicate chatter as Mr Pinchy
and Phillip chat about the day's events.

I should point out
that Mr Pinchy and Phillip are not sleeping together. Theirs is a purely
platonic friendship, built on mutual admiration and trust. Besides,
Mr Pinchy isn't a very sexual corporate icon. He prefers a nice, cool
sip of water from a nearby brook. He is trying to build a better future
for Japan.

Phillip is a very
noble creature. Horses are the most dignified

of all God's creatures,
wouldn't you say?

Since the beginning
of time, man has yearned to attach Nicolas Cage's head to the body of
a small dog.

Finally, through advanced surgical techniques, this dream can be realised.
The dog/man conundrum can be resolved.

Cage called the twelve-hour operation, "tough, challenging, but
hugely rewarding. I felt that I grew immensely as a person and as a
dog". It should be noted, that far from growing, he is now only
three foot tall, even when standing on his furry hind legs.

The administration centre was empty, apart
from DEATH. He sat there, bored and restless. It was only a matter of seconds
before the bell would sound and he would be summoned to the earthly plane
to administer another poor soul's last rites. He regretted taking the job.
Still, it paid the rent.

He resented working on Christmas Day, and had
considered making a complaint to Duncan, the union rep, but he knew the contract
stipulated 365 days a year. No holidays. No overtime. No chance of going on
strike. Not really much point in complaining.

There was a tiny placard sellotaped to the
wall:

"You don't have to be dead to work
here...but it helps!", it screamed in fruity pink letters. He hated
that bloody placard. It was no laughing matter... not for him. He was DEATH
and he had a reputation to protect. Besides, he knew he'd get hauled up
to heaven if he ever started slacking. That Jesus was a pious son of a gun.

He picked his nose and pondered how ambulance
drivers and doctors always seemed to develop a macabre sense of humour about
death and other unpleasantness. They ended up cracking jokes about rape victims
and playing "hide the pancreas" at autopsies. Bloody wankers - no
better than students.

DEATH didn't find anything that funny. He'd
been working the same shift for thousands of years and still hadn't developed
that nasty sense of humour. When he wasn't working (which was almost never)
e liked Laurel and Hardy, Chaplin, Little and Large - the classic slapstick
stuff.

There hadn't been much to laugh about for
the last 100 years or so. He had stopped smiling at all sometime during World
War I. That was when the job had gone from difficult to nigh impossible. He
had pleaded with God for extra help, but the Old Man was set in his ways.

If DEATH were in charge of the operation he'd
totally change the infrastructure - from the top down. The afterlife needed
a quality management consultant. He waited impatiently for Sir John Harvey
Jones to die. Maybe that would help.

DEATH idly thought of ways to reduce his
workload. One evening he had been pissed on cider and had considered leaving
the cure for cancer on a medical desk when he next was on Earth - but he knew
that God was delaying the release of that project for another couple of decades.
Some PR Guru had told God that releasing it so soon after the millennium would
make people nervous - would lead some nuts to putting 2 and 2 together and
making 5. DEATH didn't much like PR gurus. He enjoyed watching them die.

Martin walked into the room. "Alright boss?
Coffee?", he was relentlessly cheery. In life he had been an undertaker
and he had made the transition into the afterlife with consummate ease. He
made Death nervous - despite the little man's amiability, he always got the
impression that Martin was after his job.

"No thanks. No point. I'll only get
called away."

Martin sat at his desk and filed away the documents
covering the new arrivals. He whistled, as he always did, and Death resisted
the urge, as he always did, to punch him in the face.

The buzzer sounded. He was used to it, but
it always filled him with dread. He wondered if he'd ever get used to it.
Probably. He got used to most things, eventually.

"Oooh, this is an interesting one, boss.
Assassination. Gang-related. Colombia," piped Martin, as though death
were a novelty.